Was Sourav Ganguly lazy? Greg Chappell makes fresh revelations from his controversial India coaching stint

Former Australian cricketer and coach Greg Chappell might be one of the most respected cricketers in Australia. However, he continues to remain a controversial figure in the history of Indian cricket.

He had a contentious coaching stint with Team India between 2005-07, during which India had considerably struggled in the international platform. Furthermore, what made headlines was his infamous fallout with then Indian skipper Sourav Ganguly, as the latter was ousted from the team for a crucial period, leading to fan backlash.

Speaking to Cricket Life Stories recently, Chappell revealed that Ganguly was not a hard-working person and was just concerned by his captaincy. "The two years in India were challenging on every front. The expectations were ridiculous. Some of the issues were around Sourav being captain. He didn't particularly want to work hard. He didn't want to improve his cricket. He just wanted to be in the team as captain so that he could control things," he said.

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Chappell also reckoned that while Rahul Dravid, who succeeded Ganguly as the skipper, was adamant on being the best in the world, he was duped by his teammates. Furthermore, he still believes that bringing Ganguly back into the fray was the reason for India's disastrous performance in the ICC World Cup 2007 in Windies.

"Dravid was really invested in India becoming the best team in the world. Sadly not everyone in the team had the same feeling. They would rather concentrate on being in the team. There was some resistance from some of the senior players because some of them were coming to the end of their careers. When Sourav got dropped from the team, we had a lot of attention from the players because they realized if he can go, anyone can go. We had a great 12 months, but then, the resistance got too much, Ganguly came back into the team," he recalled.

Chappel also added that despite all the controversies surrounding, he was offered a new contract by the Board of Control for Cricket in India. However, he decided against it. "The message from the players was loud and clear 'We don't want change'. Even though the board offered me a new contract, I decided that I did not need that kind of stress," he concluded.

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